Case Number 01852

NINJA SCROLL

The Charge

"The river to Hell is this way!" -- Tessai

Opening Statement

When the village of Shimoda, on the fringes of the Tokugawa Shogunate,
succumbs to a mysterious plague, the local lord sends his crack ninja team to
investigate. A cadre of supernatural villains, the Eight Devils of Kimon,
quickly slaughters the team. Only one female ninja, Kagero, survives.

Enter a hero: Jubei Kibagami is a ronin with a heart of gold. He wanders the
land, fighting for justice, if the price is right. But is 100 gold pieces from a
wisecracking spy enough to tempt him into battle with the dreaded Eight Devils
and their master, the evil and immortal Lord Gemma -- especially since Jubei
already decapitated Gemma years ago?

The Evidence

By all rights, Ninja Scroll should fail. It is, after all, full of the
clichés of the fighting anime: a reticent hero battling superpowered bad
guys (who always seem amused by their own capacity for evil) in excessively gory
splendor. Throw in a tough heroine (who still needs periodic rescuing), an
indestructible final boss, some gratuitous (and borderline tasteless) sexual
violence, and enough arterial spray to power a downtown city fountain.

But Ninja Scroll works...somehow. It is not the best action film ever
made, or even that high on the list. But it manages to succeed at what it tries
to be: a thrilling ride.

Part of this is due to its interesting array of action sequences. In many
fighting anime, the battles get rather repetitive. But writer and director
Yoshiaki Kawajiri (known for his over-the-top supernatural epics like Wicked
City) manages to keep things moving with a few visual surprises and some
genuine scares and suspense. While the animation and art direction are obviously
limited by budget, the film makes up ground with a story that moves almost too
quickly to reveal its plot holes and characters that have just enough
personality to keep them interesting.

Jubei has a dry sense of humor (his verbal sparring with the spy Dakuan are
an entertaining diversion from the action). As an action hero, he does not rely
on brawn and bravado, usually winning his fights with a combination of
cleverness and preternaturally good luck (mostly the latter). As woman whose
very touch is poison, Kagero is both threatened and threatening, and Kawajiri
takes the opportunity to suggest the ways in which women in these sorts of
action films are marginalized as objects of abuse. But the villains themselves
-- "a gang of freaks," as Dakuan describes them -- are the most
entertaining aspect of the film -- as well they should be. Their soap opera
relationships with each other give them something to talk about between battles,
and during the battles, they deploy a clever fusion of magic and steampunk
technology. Kawajiri offers a new challenge for each of Jubei's duels with the
Eight Devils: a blind samurai, a hunchback with a legion of wasps, an explosives
expert who wires up zombies to explode. And Gemma himself, whose plan to heist a
shipment of gold to finance a coup against the Tokugawa Shogun injects a little
politics into the story, helping to ground the fantastic elements in the context
of actual Japanese history.

Okay, maybe it is not all that well grounded. Nevertheless, the 90 minutes
flies by so quickly that you will not think too much about it. Just in case you
have trouble following the plot (although it probably does not matter), Manga
Video offers a "Guide to Ninja Scroll" as a bonus feature.
There is a thorough, perhaps too thorough, synopsis of the plot. I have seen
this movie at least a dozen times over the years, and it never seemed as
complicated watching it as it does reading about it. There are also character
descriptions. Manga Video throws in a theatrical trailer with its original
Japanese soundtrack, but with all the Japanese intertitles replaced by cheap
looking English ones.

Manga Video presents the film in full frame (I can find no information on
its original aspect ratio, although I could swear I've seen a Japanese print in
widescreen), in pretty decent shape (although it seems slightly faded), with a
mediocre English dub in 5.1, and the original Japanese soundtrack in, as is
typical for most Manga Video releases, plain old 2.0. This is pretty standard
for one of Manga Video's older titles, so I suppose there is no point in
complaining about it now.

Closing Statement

Ninja Scroll has modest ambitions: it does not aspire to epic status,
but it does not dumb down its material either. Overall, it is a pretty
entertaining action film that might be worth a rental. Somehow, I manage to find
myself sitting in front of it, either at a con or a friend's house, every now
and again. I watch it, enjoy it while it lasts, and then go on to something
else. I would not go out of my way to watch it, but I do not run from it either.
I suppose, given all the genuinely unlikable movies out there, that is not
really a bad thing.

The Verdict

Yoskiaki Kawajiri and company are released, but Manga Video is ordered to mop
up all the blood from Jubei's escapades. Case dismissed.